Datamarts are types of software programs that allow users to aggregate, sort, sift, and manipulate data from a number of sources. These sources of data can be, for example, databases or internet web servers. Users describe the types of data they wish the datamarts to access, from which source, and how that data should be manipulated. The users use data descriptions to access the data from these sources.
In some systems, the data descriptions include the actual instructions that access the specific source. For example, the data descriptions might includes an SQL language instruction to access a specific database. The problem with these types of data descriptions are that they are very data source specific. For example, if a data description works for one type of SQL database, this same description will not work to access the same data in a different type of database. The data description will have to be translated into an instruction for the other type of database.
Therefore, what is needed is an improved data description mechanism that can be used to access data independently from the source. Also, what is needed is a system that supports such data descriptions.